


starting workshop fires (start heart)

by yuuki_Illene



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Featuring Mother Hen Rhodey, Fluff, Iron Husbands, M/M, MIT Era, Mutual Pining, Tony's Internal Screams, kiss already, pining oblivious idiots
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-01
Updated: 2019-05-01
Packaged: 2020-02-10 16:27:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,903
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18664078
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yuuki_Illene/pseuds/yuuki_Illene
Summary: In which everyone knows that Tony and Rhodey are more than friends except the two in question.Or alternatively, if Tony listens to Rhodey say no one wants him, he's going to lose it.IronHusbands Bingo 2019: B5 - Rejection





	starting workshop fires (start heart)

“I don’t get it,” Rhodes lamented.

Shooting up from the bench, the canned beer in his hand sloshed, some of the contents spilling onto the floor. Intoxicated as he was, Rhodes could barely find it himself to care about the mess he was making. In front of him, Tony poured half and half into a bowl in the sink while nodding to what he was saying.

“Tony, why do my relationship keep- keep failin’?” He asked miserably. “Am I doing something wrong? Do they jus’- just think I’m not desirable?”

His best friend stilled at his words, slamming the carton of milk — _Milk? Why do we have milk in the labs?_ Rhodes squinted — on the table. “If they think that you’re not desirable or amazing, they need to get their brains checked.” His best friend replied in a matter-of-factly manner, pointing his long spoon at him. “Rhodey-bear, anyone would be lucky to have _you_ . They should be counting their lucky stars that they have your care and attention or just be in your _orbit_ , okay. And unlike most of the population, you’re not that stupid, so that’s a plus.”

Rhodes threw his leg over the bench so he could slump on the table to watch Tony work. The alcohol must be working because his face was feeling unnaturally hot. “People aren’t stupid, Tones, you’re just a genius.”

Tony squinted at the apparatus in the sink. “Well, if I’m a genius like you said, then trust me when I say that people want you and that you’re smart.”

“On the count of smart, yes. People wanting me? Leave the human interactions to me, Little T, you have much ta’ learn.”

Frustrated, Tony let out an incoherent mumble.

“Whuh-?” Rhodes asked in confusion as the younger man turned to stalk into the assistant’s office. He was too tipsy to manage Tony-speak, but he wondered what he said.

Seconds later, he returned, dragging a large silver thermos behind him. Rhodes couldn’t help the chuckle that rose from his throat.

It seemed like the world damned Tony to have a shorter height to restore the karmic balance for his brilliance; watching him lunge around large equipment was always a sight, both comical and arms wise. (Tony was _strong_ for his stature and watching him work on cars was a scene Rhodey has yet to remove from his mind.)

But his brain immediately halted when he realised _what_ was being dragged.

“Tony?”

“Yes, my platypus fiend?”

“Why are you dragging around liquid nitrogen?” He briefly lifted his head to check if the Bunsen burner was on. Thankfully, it wasn’t.

“It’s safe, I promise.”

“The last time you told me that I had to put out three fires,” Rhodes deadpanned, slurring slightly.

“Two,” Tony corrected.

“Only because you had the hindsight of throwing your head under the sink and blasting the faucet on your face.”

“I agree to _dis, a, gree_ .” Tony sang. “ _I_ wasn’t on fire. It was just a spark.”

“That’s what your eyebrows tried to say,” muttered Rhodes.

With shocking ease, Tony lifted the thermos and poured the liquid nitrogen into the sink. Rhodes goes quiet for a moment, drinking in the look of concentration on his best friend’s face. His hair was stuck out in numerous directions, his hoodie was splashed with new and old coffee stains, his tongue jutted out from his lips, and yet, he was still strangely good to look at.

_Maybe it’s his dedication_ , Rhodes decided.

Tony’s passion and determination couldn’t be measured in normal standards or by the Scoville scale. Rather, a means to measure it didn’t exist yet. Quantifying Tony’s brilliance just wasn’t possible. He was always larger than life; brimming with an insatiable curiosity that swept even the best of their professors of their feet. He was star fire with the way he took the metals of concepts and disciplines to merge them into stronger alloys and hammered them into understandable shapes.

Smoke continued to rise from the sink as Tony stirred and added more liquid nitrogen intermittently. Cold air swirled around the Stark like some kind of ethereal haze and when he smiled, apparently satisfied with his experiment, it felt like the sun was breaking out.

“Pass me a petri dish, please?” Tony asked as he poked the contents in the bowl a few more times.

Mutedly, Rhodes pulled open a lower drawer to retrieve the glass dish before passing it over. Humming under his breath, Tony scooped up his yield before sliding it back. He fidgeted.

“Ice cream?” Rhodes gaped, tracing the rims of the gains. “In a petri dish?"

Tony raised an eyebrow. “And?”

Rhodey wasn’t sure what he was expecting — he was speaking to someone who made grinded in beans in a commonly used mortar, abused filter papers and made his coffee over a Bunsen burner. At this point, he was half convinced that he stored his foodstuffs with chemicals in the fridge.

Smiling, Rhodes said, “Thanks Tones, I really appreciate it.”

Cheeks dusting pink, Tony replied, “You’re welcome. I just heard, um, ice cream was good for helping with break ups.”

Lapping up a generous portion with his tongue and moaning slightly at the sweet semi-solid hitting his tongue, Rhodes murmured, “Thanks, I appreciate it, buddy. Everything tends to be better when you’re ‘round.”

Faintly, “Ah. Everything is better around you too.”

…

 

On the list of things Rhodes will never comprehend, he doesn’t get how people can look at _Tony Stark_ and think he was a put together asshole.

Asshole, he understood.

When he first met Tony, he had thought the same too. The boy was constantly stuck in his own headspace, had no concept about his privileges and seemed to believe that he was from a higher plane compared to everyone else.

He also had the uncanny ability to look at someone with such disinterest they may as well be _air_. It was like his mind compartmentalised between what he deemed significant (research papers and a select few in the university) and insignificant, which was to say almost everything else. He didn’t go out of his way acknowledge people regularly, and if he ever deigned to, he flayed them with his sharp wit nine out of ten times.

But when Rhodes scratched past the surface, it was easy to _understand_ why Anthony Edward Stark was the way he was.

With the social circles he was raised in, and later being stuck in a boarding school, he had little exposure to what ‘normal’ was. Once he did get a taste, he adapted, and started piecing the disenfranchised and the normative into his own view of society. Above all, he was insatiably curious — sometimes to the point where the tangents overwhelmed him and it was the only thing he could fixate on — which was why he seemed to traverse the hallways in a daze sometimes.

And raised as a Stark, Tony learnt to see every stranger in a different light.

His first question to Rhodes was: _What do you want from me?_

Not asking after his name, his major or his hobbies like a normal person would. Tony thought everyone only came to him because they wanted something _from_ him, not because they wanted him for him.

(When the boy confided in him quietly about how often he had been kidnapped and betrayed so many times that he had lost count, after a nightmare that sent him reeling awake and screaming, Rhodey’s heart had broken for him. It spoke volumes when the engineering prodigy lost count of the times where his faith was misplaced, and he couldn’t calculate the extent of his mistrust.)

Everyone saw the facade that the Stark heir wanted them to see; none of them bothered to look closer or puzzle out his behaviour. And in spite of that, they saw fit to give his best friend unsuitable names: overwhelming, cocky, prick, riding on his father’s cottontails and even insane.

Every time he heard that, his fists would unintentionally curl even though he wasn’t one to be prone to violence.

Rhodey learned to quickly to take a page out of Tony’s book and ignore them after many meaningful tugs on his sleeve and muttered comments to ignore them. If they couldn’t see the true worth of Tony Stark, it was their loss and his gain.

Which brought him to item number two of their ignorance: Tony Stark was _not_ put together.

He maintained that anyone who said that had clearly never seen him after a two-day binge, where the boy was functioning off his hindbrain rather than his frontal cortex. With the helpless, blurry brown eyes that he’d blink at anyone in his vicinity while starfished on the ground, anyone who had accusations against him would fold like wet paper against his expression. He was _deadly_ in that state. Tony could unintentionally extort favours and _he had_.

Furthermore, Rhodes had to wrangle him out of his bed or lab every single day, resorting to breakfast bribery just to ensure that his attendance was around acceptable levels. He frequently forgot to eat his meals and he knew this because he has witnessed Tony lying on the table, passed out from hunger. If not for the tap water in the labs, he suspected that Tony would have been dehydrated too.

And don’t even get Rhodey started on hygiene. The boy forgot to shower and stunk up the lab — to his own advantage apparently since it ensured no one else would steal the space from him — he made his coffee in beakers with Bunsen burner despite the coffee maker that was sitting at the end of the lab. He can’t reiterate enough about half the substances that have been in those apparatus (including and notwithstanding motor oil, _how even_ ) and it always seemed to fall on deaf ears.

Tony Stark was a hot, piping mess and he doesn’t understand why no one understood that.

“You spend too much time with him,” his significant others frequently accused, to which he could only slump.

“You’ve _seen_ him, right?” Rhodes spluttered out. “He literally can’t take care of himself.”

Maybe Tony should have kept his nanny?

“That doesn’t necessitate you running to him every time he calls!”

“The last time I didn’t, he nearly set the entire lab on fire,” Rhodes deadpanned back, and that was the end of that conversation.

He’s not even wrong about it either. He was pretty certain Howard Stark accidentally funded the entirety of the newest line of fire prevention measures due to his son’s incendiary tendencies. (There was also a fire prevention manual circulating around; Tony had his own damn section and he got an honorary mention as one of the fire prevention responses.)

Now that there’s DUM-E trailing after Tony, he felt more assured that there was back-up when he wasn’t around.

Well, that was a work in progress.

“Listen well, R2D2—” DUM-E beeped in confusion before whining his name in two separate high-pitched noises— “When you see your idiot creator over here starting a fire, all you need to do is pull the pin, grab the hose and squeeze-ack—”

Rhodey proceeded to flail his hands in front of him to block his face as a cold spray hit him as DUM-E gleefully spun his wrist joint to cover him. The dry powder of the fire extinguisher _did not taste good_.

Finally catching the nozzle, he released the pressure the DUM-E’s claw was placing on it. “Not me DUM-E! Disengage! Disengage!” He protested, coughing and laughing simultaneously at the robot’s exuberance.

After swiping some of the substance off, he chuckled. “I’m not on fire, buddy. But good job, that’s how you do it.”

Testily, DUM-E twisted his claw again before letting out another short spurt to cover Rhodey’s face again.

“Aw, _come on_ ,” Rhodey whined. “Now you’re just doing this on purpose.”

The robot does what he could only describe as a huff as he dropped the fire extinguisher into his lap before wheeling away to his corner. It inherited its creator’s propensity for chaos, and Rhodes can’t help but find it a little endearing. Shaking his head, he turned to look at Tony, who held a soldering iron above his newest project, seemingly frozen in motion.

“You might want to check where you’re positioning that,” he said dryly.

Tearing his brown eyes away from him, Tony muttered, “Yeah. I got it.”

Casually, Rhodey slinked over to his table and observe what his best friend was doing over his shoulder. If he leaned too close and smudged dry powder all over Tony’s shirt, he was in no position to complain since it was his creation’s fault that fore covering him in it in the first place.

“Do you?”

Tony shrugged back into his chest. “In theory. Testing different positionings for the surface mounts and improving on the capacitors and resistors for the circuit board.”

“Seeking to revolutionise another industry, Tones?” Rhodes teased. Deeply, he wished he could match his genius, if only to share his vision for a while and lift him higher.

“Trying.”

“You’ll succeed.” Rhodes squeezed his shoulder, willing the boy’s insecurities away. “You always do, Tones.”

“Thanks, Rhodey-bear.”

 

…

 

At this point, with so many failed relationships, Rhodes wondered why he even tried anymore.

Maybe he should swear off relationships in general? The world must be telling him something if none of them ever seemed to work out properly.

He must have muttered his thoughts out loud since Tony replied, “Maybe it’s because you’re not with the right person.”

“Easy for you to say,” Rhodes grumbled as he shuffled forward in the queue. “You’re not the one who’s constantly getting shoved off after a few months, Tones.”

The people around him go unnaturally quiet but he ignored them.

“Look closer maybe?” Tony insisted, a note of desperate tinging his voice.

Morosely, “They’re either already in a relationship or they’ve never considered me that way.”

Frustrated, the boy asked, “How can you even been sure about that when you’ve never asked?”

“Ask what?” He said distractedly.

“Ah, Jimmy. You’re back again,” the shopkeeper greeted him jovially, effectively ending the conversation he had with Tony. “What would you like? The usual?”

“Yeah. Thanks, Ramon.”

Before he could continue, the shopkeeper interjected: “Two sets of aglio olio with a side of salad and coffee to take away, right?”

“You got that right,” Rhodes nodded. He took out his wallet as Ramon yelled the order to the kitchen.

Handing the money over, Rhodes joked, “It’s a testament to how much I come here considering how you know my order by heart.”

“For a loyal customer like you? Always. So? Who’s the person you’ve brought with you today? Is that the boy you’re always buying pasta for?”

“Yeah. He’s Tony. Tony, Ramon.”

“Hi,” Tony mumbled, shoving his hands into his pocket.

Ramon gave his best friend a long-over. There was a strange feeling that he found something in Tony’s posturing, such that he saw fit to wink at him. “He’s quite the looker, Jimmy. Younger than I expected, but I'm sure he'll treat you right."

Rhodes blinked owlishly. “Yes?”

"Don't let anyone take away what you have with their words, _si_?” Ramon patted his hand as he gave him the food in a bag. “Love is love; treasure it, protect it and don't let it go. You're both luckier than most."

Faintly, Tony made the noise of a dying cat at the back of his throat while Rhodes remained confused. _Did that just happen?_

His head hurt at the impossibility. Sighing, he gestured Tony along. “C’mon, let’s get back on campus. We still have projects to finish.”

 

…

 

“I can’t keep doing this,” Tony said abruptly as he came through their dorm door that night.

Rhodes barely had time to turn his body before his best friend approached his bed. He climbed into his bed like he always done on bad nights, although the straddling was certainly new. He swallowed as Tony’s fingers curled around his collar.

Nervously, he asked, “What are you doing, Tones?”

“Theorising,” he said vaguely.

Yanking at his collar and jerking his head up slightly, Tony leaned forward to plant his lips on his. He tasted like the best mix of coffee and chocolate, and Rhodey instinctively reached up to hold Tony’s neck in place. There was a desperation in the way Tony’s mouth moved against his like he was afraid this was the only chance he had.

In his light-headedness, it clicked. _Ah. This is why_.

He didn’t want to stop.

This… felt _right._

He was content staying in this position forever, letting Tony claim him in every way he wished. His time, his attention and breath— so why not his heart as well?

Coaxing, he rubbed at Tony’s scalp so that they could catch some air. The boy broke away reluctantly, pupils dilated and chest heaving lightly. With their foreheads pressed so closely together, Rhodey could perceive every emotion that was flitting across his best friend’s eyes.

“Do you get it now?” Tony croaked. “I like you James. I just _do_ and if I have to hear about another of your relationships, I’m equipping DUM-E with a knife and setting him loose on them. I should be happy for you but I _can’t_. You keep saying that people don’t want you, you keep saying that your relationships don’t work out but you don’t ever look at me no matter how many methods I’ve tried to gain your attention. And I know I’m not the best candidate. Maybe I’m not in your purview at all, all the evidence points at the null hypothesis that I’m not suited for it—”

Pushing both of them up with one hand, Rhodey muttered, “Tony you need to shut up.”

He pressed his lips on Tony again, hoping his best friend would understand what he was trying to express.

He loved this dumb genius, didn’t he?

(Belatedly, he realised he would need to apologies to his ex-es because they were right on this count.)

He loved his creative chaos; the small cackles Tony would emit when he made something brilliant with a fifty-fifty chance of destruction. He loved how soft his hair was, how his stature hid a deceptive strength, he loved Tony’s focus especially when it was brought down upon him.

He answered the calls because he wanted an excuse to be there. He wanted to soak in the noises of Tony’s projects, a comforting ambience he no longer knew to do without. He cared for the boy because he couldn’t imagine a place where he wasn’t there. All the reasons have always been true, but there was even more beneath the surface.

“I reject your hypothesis with a negative 0.01% statistical significance,” Rhodey finally said. “I’m in love with you too, idiot.”

Tony squawked. “I’m not the idiot here, it’s your observation that’s horrendous-”

“And I think I was in love with you the entire time,” said Rhodey. “Why else would I have camped out in your workshop whenever I’m free? Or made sure that you were an acceptable human being and didn’t neglect your health?”

“We don’t spend that much time together,” Tony muttered. “You’re usually telling me that you’re going out.”

“I’ve always been there, you just don’t notice,” Rhodey retorted, bumping their foreheads together. “Furthermore, I would like to argue that your idea of time is skewed. If I didn’t constantly remind you of the important dates in the semester, you’d still be in last year.”

Smiling shyly, he murmured, “I don’t need a calendar when I have you?”

_Yeah, I’m screwed._ Rhodes gaped before grabbing his spare pillow and thwacking Tony on the side of his head because how was he supposed to react to _that._

“I just said something nice and you hit me with a pillow?! That’s just hurtful, sour patches!”

“That’s not valid,” Rhodey mumbled after he fell back onto his bed with the pillow on his face.

He glared at Tony as he ripped his partition away.

“What does that even _mean_?”

“You’re not allowed to be this—” he gesticulated wildly before groaning and hiding himself behind an arm. He had a thesaurus of words to describe the boy but he wasn’t about to say it.

“Honey bear, sugar plum, are you actually _blushing_?”

Rhodes doesn’t even need to look at face to know how gleeful his best friend was. He was probably grinning so widely it reached his eyes, partially hidden by his tousled hair. He groaned again, letting his arm fall to his sides.

“Yes, so if you would stop being so attractive for a second, that’d be nice.”

A blush crept up Tony’s cheeks as he registered his words. It even went up to his _ears_. Rhodey smirked. Was that a squeak he heard?

“Do you really mean it?” Tony asked suddenly, albeit softly. The silent plea to not betray him rang in the quiet.

That's all Rhodey needed to remember that this was his jaded best friend baring his heart to him. That he expected to hurt even when he sought for love, and Rhodey made a silent vow to remedy that, even if it took him an entire lifetime to accomplish it.

“Yeah, I think I do,” Rhodey swallowed. “I think I loved you for a while, even if I don’t know when it changed.”

Tony allowed himself a small smile. “That’s good.” He bent his body over and pressed his forehead against Rhodey’s heart, committing the rhythm of an elevated heart to his memory. “I loved you for a long time too. Thought you wouldn’t notice.”

“It took a bit of convincing but I got there.”

“Should have kissed you sooner.”

Laughing, he said, “Probably yeah. It would have saved us both some grief.”

“Again?”

“You don’t have to ask, Tones.”

Their lips met for a third time. It was slower and lighter this time; a series of butterfly kisses with a bit of nose bumping and teeth clashing that made them giggle. At the end, it was just him peppering kisses along Tony’s smooth jawline and the hollow of his throat while he was laughing breathlessly above him.

All that mattered was that he still had Tony and they were on the same page where their relationship was concerned.

Much later, as Tony was playing with his hair absently, Rhodey asked, “So what do you want us to be?”

His best friend thought about it. “Boyfriends? Partners?” He shrugged. “Either one is fine as long as I get to have you.”

He thumbed the curve of Tony’s smile. “I’m good with that too.”

Then: “What _do_ boyfriends do anyway?”

“Um… hang out, have meals together, talk a lot?”

Tony blinked. “So what we’ve always been doing essentially?”

They both burst out laughing at the realisation.

“I think we’ll be fine,” Rhodes grinned.

“Rhodey, we’ll be more than fine.”

 

...

 

**OUTTAKE** :

“Did you finally call me James by the way?” He realised belatedly in delight when he was recalling the incident.

“Didpf hetpun.”

“Finish brushing your teeth first, Tones.”

The sound of a loud spit take travelled from the bathroom. “Didn’t happen!”

“Did too!”

“Did _not_. You’re being delusional, sour patches.”

“I’ll drop it if you answer one question honestly,” Rhodes bargained.

“Question first.”

“Did you set the lab on fire on purpose multiple times?”

The ensuing silence was all he needed.

“Oh my god, you actually _did_.”

**Author's Note:**

> There was an idea that Tony didn't pine enough and this was born xD
> 
> I'd like to thank the amazing [kimannhart](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kimannhart/pseuds/kimannhart) for proof reading this!


End file.
